1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an optical recording medium defect management method, and more particularly, a method of formatting a rewritable optical recording medium.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Generally, an optical recording medium is classified into three types depending on whether or not data can be repeatedly recorded on the medium: a read only memory (ROM) type, a write once read many (WORM) type, on which data can be written only once, and a rewritable type, on which data can be repeatedly written.
As a repeatedly rewritable disc, there are two types: a rewritable compact disc (CD-RW) and a rewritable digital versatile disc (DVD-RAM, DVD-RW). In case of such a rewritable optical disc, as a write/read operation of information is repeatedly performed, the mixing ratio of the mixtures that constitute a recording layer for recording information thereon becomes different from the initial mixing ratio. The mixing ratio loses the characteristic of the recording layer itself, and this causes an error to occur during the write/read operation of the information.
This phenomenon is called deterioration, and a deteriorated area appears as a defect area during the performance of optical disc initializing, writing, and reading commands. Also, in addition to deterioration, a defect area of a rewritable optical disc may be caused by a scratch on the disc surface, fine dust on the disc, error during production of the disc, etc. Accordingly, management of such a defect area is required in order to prevent data from being written/read on the defect area formed by the above-described causes.